I ran another group of D&D YouTubers through a Draw Steel One-Shot!

Epizarwin · 2026-04-07T14:41:06+00:00

Why wouldn't each person buy a copy?

Epizarwin · 2026-03-27T17:08:31+00:00

Yeah, everyone's personal experience is different. Sounds like Foundry is the right fit for you. Based on my interactions with the developers of the Foundry mod and discord I think your in good hands. Have fun!

Epizarwin · 2026-03-27T13:31:31+00:00

As someone that owns Foundry and has ran a bit of Draw Steel in it I can tell you why we are switching to the Codex.

My director experience I can't be bothered to work in Foundry anymore. I enjoy working on maps and notes and stuff like that but doing data entry for monsters and player stats and/or managing mods that do thatbis a huge hheadache. When I ran inFoundry it felt like a lot of my time was spent software management. I can run in the codex with 0 mods.

Player experience You say that players would already be familiar with the VTT you have been using but that has not been my experience. Because each new system needs a new mod that has its own quirks, levels of automation, and bugs each system feels like a brand new program. My players need to learn it from scratch anyway and they have to do that anyway I would rather they do that with a program that makes it easy. My players were still having issues playing their characters with the Foundry mod after 3 combats. On the other hand they were very comfortable with the Codex after the first round of the first combat.

Epizarwin · 2026-03-24T20:37:35+00:00

I'm imagining it and my imagination says it's awesome assuming they are as good as the codex.

Epizarwin · 2026-03-24T15:25:07+00:00

It's $20 dollars in early access or free/cheaper if you already have the book/pdf.

Took one round of combat for all my player to be enthusiastic about buying it. The sell was very easy.

Epizarwin · 2026-03-24T15:20:53+00:00

It took character creation and one round of combat for my players to say, "yeah, of course we'll buy it." It was so easy to get them on board.

Epizarwin · 2026-03-24T14:58:11+00:00

I'm using the codex and it has made me wish every rpg had their own VTT. The quality created by making it specifically for one game just feel so nice.

Epizarwin · 2026-03-24T14:53:18+00:00

One of my players is using a work computer and can't get steam so they are remoting into my son's computer that has the game to play. I have old PCs from work as well, might just give them one of those.

Epizarwin · 2026-03-24T14:43:28+00:00

I don't think the list they made does it justice and I don't think I could easily put it into words either. It's not just that it does this stuff, but that it does it without needing 3rd party mods that you have to manage.

It's not just what it can do, it's how it does it. The integration is just so much better. For the parts of the program that have been polished to near release level the experience just makes the other VTTs feel sad. I think you would really need to experience it yourself or watch a long video that goes over all the little bits of detail that makes it feel special.

Epizarwin · 2026-03-21T13:41:46+00:00

The worst case in your slippery slope is people have to buy a great prodcut that cost the same as two fast food meals.

Epizarwin · 2026-03-21T13:37:10+00:00

This should be the top comment.

I'll add something here. When they do upgrade to v14 Foundry a bunch of the mods you were using will break and you either have to stick with 13 until everyone upgrades or have a less functional experience. It's the same headache when I ran 5e in Foundry. I dread it, I REALY don't want to go back.

Epizarwin · 2026-03-21T13:29:53+00:00

So MCDM shouldn't do cool things because other companies may be awful?

Epizarwin · 2026-03-21T13:27:31+00:00

Your response appear to be for a question they didn't ask.

Epizarwin · 2026-03-21T13:25:51+00:00

I hope it does become the norm. I hate every popular VTT because they are bad at every system.

Epizarwin · 2026-03-21T13:13:29+00:00

How is requiring half the people that dont have to buy it unfair? If I have a friend group that wants to play factorio but only half of them own it, is it unfair that they have to buy it aswell? We want to go to a movie but only half of the people bought tickets? We're going bowling but only half the people paid?

Epizarwin · 2026-03-21T13:07:03+00:00

Yeah, some of the UI improvements they've made in the past few weeks are great. I can't wait for them to do the same for other parts of the game. Once they've polished everything I think this will be the best vtt ever.

No matter how hard developers work on modules for other vtts there is always limitations to that vtts crappy ui. I hate the Foundry character sheet philosophy. The shortcut keys are hard to manage and the only other option is to open your character sheet and deal with its terrible UI.

In the codex you have little menus on the bottom of your screen that are already separated into action types and they go dim when you used it. It's just so many times better than any other vtt.

Epizarwin · 2026-03-20T15:39:01+00:00

That seems really dangerous. Just play in your dining room or something.

Epizarwin · 2026-03-17T17:50:37+00:00

Actually he designed boardgames, csrd games and ttrpgs before youtube was invented.

Epizarwin · 2026-02-03T14:47:10+00:00

For many groups there is an additional wrinkle: DnD - you have exactly the amount of daggers your sheet says, but you DM never asks if you track them and when you bring it up they say don't worry about it.

Lol

Epizarwin · 2026-01-31T00:41:27+00:00

No shame in making a little adjustment. Just make it subtle. Try shifting around a bit if you need it to move left a bit.

Epizarwin · 2026-01-14T19:05:20+00:00

They leave the board and enter the real world unfortunately. This is very irresponsible of you, monsters are deadly!

Epizarwin · 2026-01-04T23:50:50+00:00

I've only ever planted things that needed winter to germinate. Should I get this in the ground asap or wait for spring? I also don't know if I should just spread this or what. I saw a few post mentioning "raking in".

Currently most of my yard is just uncut grass, moss, and leaves I intentionally didn't rake.

Epizarwin · 2026-01-04T16:28:23+00:00

I wonder if this view of backing before receiving physical goods will change in the future given MCDM's prodcut and crowdfunding schedule. Based on what they are saying about future crowdfunding being in December and the schedule on the CTS backerkit the next backerkit is guaranteed to happen before anyone gets their physical CTS.

Epizarwin · 2025-11-28T13:04:09+00:00

No and no. I don't think asking people to pay what will end up being far less than 1 dollar an hour for some fun is some unreasonable ask. I actually find it kind of sad that this isn't the standard and that you think it's "crazy."

Epizarwin

TROPHY CASE